Jason Hickey is lead environment artist at Insomniac Games.
Do you know what makes a great environment artist? It's probably not what you think. Environment art is not about making pretty things.
Well not just about making pretty things. The greatest artists I have worked with have been amazing visual designers but also excellent decision makers. That's the trick, you've got to be able make great decisions.
Effective decision making as an environment artist means understanding the technical process, the intent of the gameplay and story, and the aesthetics of the space being created.
Imagine this horrible scenario:
The world exclusive demo of your game is next week and your level is on the big stage. It's a dream come true. Everyone will see it and it looks beautiful. Unfortunately it just won't run. The GPU spikes at every review. It crawls at 12fps and all the LODs are showing only their lowest mips. It's all gone horribly wrong! The worst part is that even when it does hit 30fps, nobody enjoys playing it. It's a disaster.
But it's pretty, so at least you have done your bit, right?
Wrong.
"Environment art is not about making pretty things. It is about making fun games that people can play — just like every other part of game development. You have to make it fun and beautiful."
Environment art, I'll say it one more time, is not about making pretty things. It is about making fun games that people can play — just like every other part of game development. The only possible difference is that you have to make it fun and beautiful.
You have a lot of responsibility. You will need to work across disciplines and be able to make important, informed decisions daily. I am not talking about what color the table cloth should be but how you are going to help make the game more fun and make it run smoothly.
The biggest blocker in new artists is the confidence to make these decisions (which stems from not knowing how to prepare for the unknown — I will address that too). Making the right decision is easy. You just need to understand the intent of your level, prepare for the unknown, make your decision based off all this and double check you achieve the intent.
Hickey is lead environment artist at Insomniac on Marvel's Spider-Man
Step 1: Understanding the Intent
With good directors, this can be super easy. I am working as lead environment artist on the Spider-Man game at Insomniac and they have made the direction of the game very clear. Without spoiling anything – the game should make you feel like... Spider-Man! I am a fan so this was an easy thing for me to wrap my head around.
Sometimes things can be a lot less clear. If you find yourself in a situation where you do not know what your game is and why you are making it, I encourage you to sit down with your game director or creative director or whoever has the vision and really understand it. Then take the notes you have made and construct three pillars for yourself – if they do not already exist.
A pillar is essentially a word or phrase that you can easily remember and sums up the player experience. It should be something very clear (but can have secondary meaning and subtleties too) that you can apply to each discipline in a meaningful way. I have included a sidebar of pillars that I have seen during my career before I started my latest role at Insomniac Games.
GOOD PILLARS |
|---|
Intimate Brutality (Conjures up emotions and can affect animation, gameplay and even materials) |
Altered History (Especially useful for env and character but it's implied realism could affect animation too) |
Isolation (A lot of meaning for environments, audio, animation, character design - good pillar) |
Relatable (This seems a bit fluffy but applied to a sci-fi game this is a great pillar for environment, audio, character's, dialogue) |
After this I would do the same thing for the level you are about to work on. Figure it out with your designer. Is it to show off stealth? Introduce you to a new move or character? Maybe it's a hub space? Maybe it's supposed to scare the player or make them feel almighty? Understand the final vision of the fun of the space. It may not be fun for a while, especially if it's the start of development, but try to visualize the potential fun of what it will be by release.
SAMPLE CHECKLIST OF DESIGN INTENT | EXAMPLES |
|---|---|
Mood | Humor, Stealthy, Action! |
Mechanics | Basic Combat, Traversal, Puzzles |
Story | Sad, New Character, Epilogue |
Stage of the Game (what comes before & after) | Tutorial, Low Intensity, Last Boss |
No tags.
